Angus’ Agro Advice – Spring

Soil Testing

Spring is the perfect time for soil testing, placing special consideration on any paddocks with future legume or canola rotations.

Book in your grid sampling with Nutrien Strathalbyn to better understand pH levels on your farm and mitigate your supply risk of lime for the 2023/24 Summer.

RLEM Control

The timing for red legged earth mite control is approaching – please use the link below to find out the date for your property.

It is better to be a week in front of this date, rather than a week too late!

https://www.wool.com/land/timerite/calculatedate/

RLEM severity risk assessment (shinyapps.io)

RLEM can develop resistance very quickly and it is best to strategically expose these populations to a lethal dose of insecticide before diapause eggs are laid.

By controlling this phase of the lifecycle (shown below), you can greatly reduce the amount of RLEM hatching in autumn.

Spray Topping

Spring time provides an opportunity for spray topping of annual grass weeds (silver grass, barley grass, wild oats, brome grass) in pastures.

Weed maturity across a paddock is generally very uneven (soil type, grazing patterns, pasture density) and the timing must be based on the majority of the paddock.

The spraying window begins after flowering, once the grass seed head has “opened up” (shown below) until the seed gets to the “milky” stage.

Glyphosate and paraquat are the two options – the selection of which chemical is based on a number of factors and should best be discussed with your agronomist.

Pasture Nutrition

It isn’t too late to be spreading pastures – target the later maturing pastures which are likely to be responsive to extra fertiliser.

For those who have had trafficability issues and have not applied any fertiliser yet, there is still opportunity.  

Spring fertiliser applications are especially helpful in situations where feed on offer is tight, silage has been cut or if you are looking to maximise your hay yield.